@RJP1973 are you referring to the NJMS program?
GPA deficit has to be compensated with very strong ECs (research or volunteering) and compelling essays.
What type of activities fall under âclinicalâ? Is it true that shadowing valued less than the other two? Thanks
I was trying to a quote a comment from @srk2017 , but any feedback from anybody is appreciated!
@srk2017 Thank You!
Thank you grtd2010! But I really do not understand why do these programs say they look at individual high schools, what kinda classes students have taken. But in reality they are looking at only unweighted GPA. I feel its not fair
I see what you say, in fact had been in the same boat few years ago. All these programs say something and do something else. Most of them use filters based on gpa (like >= 3.9) and SAT/ACT scores (>= 1550 and >= 34) before even looking at the applicants. Perhaps understandable considering the volume of applications they receive.
As mentioned, we had the same challenge during Câs application cycle, but the gpa was in mid 3.8 range though. Even then people were opining there is no chance if below 3.9. Fortunately C landed in top choice program and is doing fine there.
Very few of the programs are a little more holistic in that they donât blindly rule out without looking deeper. BU SMED is one such program that I am aware of, but again 3.7 may not make the cut inspite of that. Apply for a few and see what happens but donât spend too much time and energy though. See if either the school or the counselor can highlight the rigor of the school or his rank somehow, preferably on transcript.
The silver lining though, if your son attended a grueling high school, college will be a walk in the park and his gpa in college is bound to be way better.
No it does not seem fair. The selection criteria is ever changing and varies with university. Lately we noticed the creeping practices of equalizing the playing field level for URMs with ORMs by not allowing enough space to describe activities in essays, restricting key accomplishments to top 5 or 6 ones and 1-2 page resumes. Apply to this the diversity selection by race and gender in a small cohort of students 10-20 leaves the majority to compete against few spots like 2 at the most. Then apply to this the uncertainty of interviewer predilections to the nuances of your story, and student performances which make this whole process nerve racking and extremely unpredictable.
As per SDN, âIf you can smell patients, it is a clinical experience.â So it can be working at the front desk, checking in patients, taking them to examine room, delivering medicine from pharmacy to patients, transporting patients from their room to examine rooms in wheel chair etc⊠are simple tasks that qualifies. Some say working in hospital gift shop also qualifies. EMT, medical scribing etc⊠are more serious activities that need certification and I think most states you need to be 18 to get certification. Serving for underserved populations carries extra weight.
Every program will have one or candidates with below their averages get in. Same goes for traditional path also. AAMC publishes, 10%, median 75% and 90% GPA averages for traditional path.
As I said before adcoms have to find some activity or your essay very interesting to invite you for interview despite lower GPA. Hard to predict what that is and those got in with lower stats tend to not share what their hook is.
I agree. Given the intense competition at any time there are over 100 students with near perfect scores, it makes it very difficult for the admission officers to make a choice. At the end the strength of application, their perception of your yield factor, and the competition from your own district will bench mark you for selection I suppose. For a ORM the GPA should be at least 3.95 or higher to be safe, unless there is an oomph factor in your application and pray that it gets the deserved attention.
Does any one who applied to BU this year had a unweighted GPA less than 4.0? Just curious if they upped their selection criteria, given the small number of responses on the thread?
I also have another question to the seniors on this thread. Given that Step 1 is a P/F now, how will this impact the students choosing the bs/md programs offered by medical schools ranked below 50? (eg VCU, GWU, AMC, etc,) barring exceptional individual performances.
Will they be at a distinct disadvantage residency selection? We really wont have much data on matching with this new criteria yet and by which time our students get there in 2024.
My nephew who is in a BSMD program thinks Step 1 P/F is disadvantageous for him to match top programs in his state. However no one is sure at this time. PDs wants to move away from Step 1 scores and judge based on clinical experiences. Traditional path students may have more experiences during UG but not sure how much that carries into medical school and how much that will enhance their medical school activities.
Experts on SDN thinks that now residency PDs will most like use Step 2 scores and one thought is those with shorter preclinical years may benefit (lot of schools are moving from 2 years to 1 or 1.5 years). So that may be one of the criterias we may use to select medical school if my son gets multiple admissions next year/cycle.
Not sure about gpa, but did find the stats of someone on this thread earlier who was kind enough to share, that he/she got selected despite not stellar standardized test scores. Had some great recommendations though! Kind of confirming the holistic approach at BU (may not be perfect, but better than others who would have yanked out the applications right away)
By the way, not many reported getting called for interviews but many did come back (perhaps different set who are not that active here) confirming selections to the program.
@bsmdasp and others
I have seen folks with perfect GPA and SAT scores not getting selected for interviews while students with less than perfect GPAs and less than perfect SAT scores getting multiple interviews - key is your story.
Also, why transcripts matter - if you are in a competitive school, say where 80% of the students take AP/IB courses vs a school where only 20% take AP/IB courses, the 3.7 GPA has very different meaning in the context of each school.
Yes, GPA of 3.7 is at the lower end and as long as one is clear about expectations, one should proceed.
Step 1 P/F
According to AMA, average number of residency application (across all specialties) a student does is 36.4
Highest average is for surgery - 58.2
Atleast now, when Step 1 had a number, a lot of students became realistic which specialty to apply e.g. practically zero students with a score of <215 applied to derm or plastics. Imagine in P/F scenario - this average number may increase - students hedging their bets.
As long as PDs are inundated with applications, they will look for some form of objective criteria to triage the applications.
If it is not Step 1, then they will come up with their own - could be Step 2 or something else. Fact is applications will get triaged and for some the process will still be unfair.
NJMS results are beginning to come out. Good luck to everyone who applied/congrats to everyone who got in!
when are NJMS results coming out?
@walter2020 Congratulations!
what feeder school did u apply thru? How were u notified?